Date of Visit: December 2, 2012 There’s a theater that was built in 1924. It was originally a vaudeville theater but eventually became a movie house (like all the old vaudeville stages). The town declined as the post-war industrial boom died down, and the neighborhood it stood in turned rough. In 1968, a 15-year-old boy …
Date of Visit: 11/11/11 There’s a building that I love. It’s nice looking from the outside, but nothing exceptional. It was built in 1926 so it has that air of grandiosity that accompanies almost everything built in the roaring 20’s. The architect who designed it took his own life the year it was built, as …
Date of Visit: May 20, 2012 When I first saw the Wabash Alloys building in Oak Creek, Wisconsin, I wasn’t expecting much. It wasn’t particularly old – it was built in 1969 – and it was the very definition of ugly. Just a big old corrugated metal box. No charm, nothing to entice. However, as …
Date of Visit: January 14, 2012 Generally, when I explore abandoned places, I find the most interesting locations are the ones with the most “stuff” left behind. I like to try and decipher the story behind the people who once inhabited that space, whether it be the medical history of an elderly person who lived …
Date of Visit: July 15, 2012 Abandoned schools are always tremendously sad to me. Schools are the foundations of a neighborhood; mighty structures that were built to inspire, with classical architecture and, often, rich ornamentation. Schools are meant to persevere, to define a neighborhood, to inspire rivalries with other schools. Generation after generation should …
Date of Visit: September 2, 2011 As America becomes less and less religious, more and more churches become abandoned. And there’s only so much you can do to reuse a church. If it’s small, you could turn it into a residence. (Who wouldn’t want to live in a converted church?) If it’s in a trendy …